Sacramento – AB 2293 by Assemblymember Eloise Reyes (D-San Bernardino) passed out of the Assembly and now moves on to the State Senate. The bill would reduce some of the barriers faced by formerly incarcerated individuals trying to attain Emergency Medical Technician licenses, to work as firefighters or in emergency services. In 2017, over 4,500 inmates served in the California Conservation Camp program and contributed over 10 million work hours to fighting forest fires and conservation efforts around the state.

Approximately 30% of all jobs in the state of California require some type of license, up from the national average of around 25%. At the same time, approximately eight million Californians have some sort of criminal background that leads to a growing segment of our citizenry that are procedurally locked out of a large portion of the job market.

“It is overwhelmingly clear that our current system of occupational licensing leaves many who have paid their debt to society almost completely out of the job market,” said Assemblymember Reyes. “We will continue to see Californians quite literally locked out of the market if our licensing makes life sentences out of single sentences.” Assemblymember Reyes continued, “AB 2293 will remove some of the licensing barriers that prevent many in our state from attaining positions that require these licenses but flatly deny them based on the presence of any criminal history.”

AB 2293 next goes to the State Senate to be heard in policy committee. For more information on the bill or to follow it, click here.

Assemblymember Eloise Gómez Reyes represents Assembly District 47 which includes the cities of Fontana, Rialto, Colton, Grand Terrace, San Bernardino and the unincorporated areas of Muscoy and Bloomington.